Love books!

Unfortunately too often we hear and read (or even experience) sad news about difficulties regarding the library services, not just in the UK. Libraries are being closed, funds limited, staff hours cut and people made redundant. It is definitely a situation calling for action. But how to advocate in this subject, what can be done? Will just a collection of signatures under all sorts of petitions help? Will protesting on streets help? Not many of these have helped before in similar or even more serious (e.g. war on Iraq) cases.
The Women's Institute runs a campaign Love Your Libraries calling to sign their petition . That is, of course, a positive action against cuts and threat of closure of some 20% of the UK public libraries. But shouldn't we rather start campaigning with something like LOVE BOOKS action and address it to the youngest, the school children or perhaps also to their parents and these who decide about school curricula. The spectrum of titles which children are presented with at school and obliged to read is shockingly narrow. The young people, when leaving school, have never read any of the classics, never heard even the names of the greatest creators of the world's literature, know little or nothing about reference books and the only source for information for them is GOOGLE (with all due respect to it). Even if I exaggerate a bit, I don't think I am very far away from the facts.
The example at home (parents seen with a book in hand instead of being in front of the TV all the time), good school libraries with professional staff encouraging children to read and respect books could definitely help to appreciate the irreplaceable value of books in life and the value of libraries. All sorts of them - public, school, academic etc. Books are and should remain the best friends for us - in good and in bad times, in work and leisure, always. So yes - let's run campaigns, let's shout about all that is important for us, but let's start there where it really begins and hopefully it should fruit later in everybody's life.
The participation of well known people - celebrities - in actions like this might be a great help. Probably their voice is better heard than thousands of signatures collected on the petition or even a march of librarians on Oxford Street in London. Someone like Joanna Lumley perhaps? She proved that she can be heard!

Speaking up, writing down

I have been there, done it all, participated - passively and actively - observing and presenting, helping in organising conferences. And publishing, a lot. All in my past academic career.
No one doubts the importance of conferences, meeting people who we have only heard about, read their publications, spoke on a phone, or followed online. Conference is like the icing on a cake - the finale of year's (or longer) work in science or any other subject. It is an opportunity to learn and to teach. It's an experience that cannot be replaced by any other method of communicating news, results and thoughts. Personal contact, even by listening to what others have to say or through discussing matters of common interest, cannot be substituted by reading reports, articles and proceedings. I used to go to conferences, national and international, both as a presenter of my own scientific work and as a passive participant. In fact, through meeting people at conferences I was invited to England some (long!) time ago and this is why I am here now.

Unfortunately participating in conferences is not easily available for all. Mostly because of the cost of this participation (often including long and expensive travel and accommodation). That is why taking part in the annual conferences libraries@cambridge for all of us who work here is such a great opportunity to keep up to date with all that is important in a library world. TeachMeat sessions are also very valuable "micro" conferences. Training sessions, occasional talks and presentation, visiting other libraries (thank you Cambridge College libraries who organised tours this summer)- all are very much appreciated and valuable possibilities to learn new things and meet new people.

It would be good to go to London sometimes or to other places where CILIP organises its conferences. For example there is one this week on reclassification, something which in my library has been a long term project and in which I have taken rather a substantial part. It would be good to hear what others have experienced in this subject and what their thoughts are. However I cannot afford it. There is an e-forum on this subject which will follow the conference. I might register for this, but it will not be the same.

Publishing it is also something I did a lot in the past. Blogging is the only form of publication I "produce" now. And it is not easy, oh no! It is good however to write down one's thoughts on various subjects even if they are not going anywhere beyond the www.blogger ...

Zotero oh Zotero!

Together with GoogleDocs, Delicious and a few others, Maestro Zotero was one of the great revelations of 23Things last year. I am still full of enthusiasm for this programme and wish all who need to write whatever - an essay, a book, a dissertation, an article, knew about this programme's existence. I do mention Zotero during inductions to students, especially those more advanced like MA's but haven't found that there was much interest in it among them. It would be good to be able to offer some special training courses to the students on these wonderful, time saving programmes. Ironically, there is no time to do it!
Mendeley looks very similar to Zotero. I will have to look closer at it, create an account and compare the two. After the holidays perhaps?
CiteULike - also later, hopefully...
All three are wonderful tools for researchers, writers, students. I may only regret that these tools did not exist when I was working on my essays and dissertations. Today I can only recommend them and try to explain how to use them (after I have learned more) to those who might need such help in their work.

Documents in the Air

Having documents available online, with the possibility of working on them from different computers and sharing them with work colleagues, has been a dream of mine since I first started working in the library. Especially in this specific library where I am employed. There are nine different locations housing the collections. Access in all of them to the documents created in one place would be perhaps not essential, but very convenient. And so much better than emailing these documents to myself and to my colleagues, copying them on memory sticks and then transferring to the other computers, creating a number of versions of the same thing - a recipe for confusion (sometimes).
There are many aspects of our work where sharing and editing documents online would be very useful. For example all sorts of lists which need constant amending (reading lists, users lists, leavers lists, overdue fine lists) or indexes to classification systems (in our libraries almost every collection has its own classification system and indexes either do not exist or are not very comprehensive).
Discovering Google Docs, thanks to 23Things, was a highlight of last year's course (for me). Unfortunately as soon as I learnt about that, had created the account and started investigating it, a big disappointment came. Docs did not work as I expected!
I blogged about the Google Docs last year. Having read this text today and looking at the documents placed there I do not think that much, if any, has changed since then. Still, formatting of the documents (both in Word and Excel) is different to those in the usual office programme. Still, downloading documents from the computer files (if it is more than a couple of pages in Word or a very simple spreadsheet in Excel) takes a long time. And sharing them - even longer.
With high hopes I looked at this year's Thing 13 (!?) - the Dropbox. At first sight it looks more promising than GoogleDocs. First of all the documents which are "dropped" to the Box from existing folders are uploaded in the same format and with the same features and facilities of working on them as they are in original. As the GoogleDocs, they can be shared with work colleagues who are able to edit them, add to them, create together. But... This is where the "BUTS" start. First "BUT" is that documents can be edited only in those computers (or other e-devices) which are added to the account and have Dropbox files installed. An IT officer may not agree to this (I haven't asked yet). The second "BUT" - the programme is not completely free (only basic and small box of 2GB is free). The third "BUT" - the whole process of "dropping", opening, saving documents is not straight forward. If the document is to be worked on and the changes saved, the document has to be opened from the computer Dropbox folder, not online. If it comes from the online box then changes cannot be saved. There is of course a way- first the changed document has to be saved somewhere in the computer and then dropped to the Dropbox online, but it will not be the changed version replacing the old one but an added second (third etc.) document. A bit similar to memory stick or emailing new versions again.
I have tried this programme using my two home computers and I liked it but if I am not allowed to install Dropbox in five library computers in my workplace, the whole idea would be lost. Back to emails and memory sticks.
The best would be to have a combination of GoogleDocs with Dropbox - the docs online only, with a possibility to amend and save them from anywhere at any time and of course free!
Just dreaming...
Wikis had been looked at and blogged about in the 23Things programme last year too. I do appreciate the idea and all the possibilities which this application offers. Privately - yes, I do use the Wikipedia, as a source of quick and mostly reliable information, no matter how much criticism it receives. Also the idea of contributing to it is appealing, e.g. in cases when one can add the information about events which one has experienced or people who one knows or knew.
At the moment however I cannot identify any particular case in which Wiki(s) may be used at my work except for, of course the Wikipedia - a quick reference "book" without the necessity of going to the the shelf where Britannica lives.

Some thoughts on social networking (in pictures)

Social networking may begin as an individual activity, face to face with a computer, at work, at home, in the internet cafe (seems rather lonely).

The ideas behind Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn etc. of improving communication between people, increasing cooperation among professionals, sharing ideas, meeting more people and making friends online are great and ...





... all these may continue as a social event (usually agreeable).









But sometimes, unfortunately, may end like this (totally antisocial).







Whichever social media and whatever the aim and result of using them, time is a limiting factor. Twenty four hours per day is rather not enough to read, write and comment in Blogger, Twitter, Facebook and all the other social network sites, when one has to eat, sleep, work, watch all favourite soaps and read books too.
I commented on some blogs and tweets I read, I received a few comments on my "creative blog-writing", but I cannot say that the circle of my friends has increased significantly due to these activities. Nobody's fault, just lack of time.




Also, some people prefer more traditional means of communicating and socialising.

To save some time when writing this blog, I have illustrated it more than usual. I believe all the images here express my thoughts better than words (universal language, no spelling and grammar mistakes!)

Wise and trusted

Parents, school teachers, university lecturers, bosses - they are all people who teach us, are our leaders, our MENTORS, those who we look up to and try to follow their example.

My first mentor was my university teacher, the head of the department I studied and worked at, the supervisor of my MS and PhD thesis. Professor Franciszek Witczak had not just a deep professional knowledge but also all the moral and cultural values which I, and I believe my colleagues too, have learned from him - objectivity, accuracy, reliability, responsibility in all we do, both in private life and in professional activities. All of these qualities, I hope, will stay with me forever. Thank you Sir.

In my second and still developing career, librarianship, I have also been very lucky. From my present boss I have learned all I know so far about this profession (starting from one of the first lessons - putting books in line with a shelf edge, I would never have thought about it before!). I also admire her knowledge, enthusiasm, ability to look at things from different angles, seeing various aspects of problems.
I have started to think of taking my career in librarianship further (beyond a library assistant) thanks to two great ladies, whom I might call my informal mentors. The first of them is my present boss and the second - the leader of the City and Guilds training course in Library and Information Services, both have very much encouraged me to continue on this route, giving shiny examples of how interesting and fulfilling it can be.

After I had become a member of CILIP, the next step was to find a formal mentor. Finding someone who could help on the route to professional librarianship - this was a TASK. The list of mentors, published on the CILIP website, is not short but to find someone who one thinks one would get on well with and who is available when needed, has been, so far, impossible in my case. The first attempt unfortunately did not give any result. The second was equally negative. All mentors were "taken"!
Since then I have hanged my formal PD (professional development) on the hook and continued just working, working and working even harder, participating in as many training courses and local conferences as possible. Now it is time to find a mentor again. Before it's too late!

In the meantime I am continuously and gratefully learning from my boss, my informal mentor, who is not only a very professional librarian, but also a great teacher. Hopefully the skills and experience I have gained under her friendly wings will take me further along the professional route until (and also when) I find a formal mentor to continue the task.

C'est la (ma) vie

Everyone has their unique story to tell. Mine is probably no more unique than those of others.
I started my professional life as a research and teaching assistant at Warsaw Agricultural University straight after finishing my MS in one of the departments there and continued in this career for the next 15 years. I hope I was liked and also respected by my students, I achieved some recognition (conferences, publications) and completed my PhD. Nothing to do with librarianship, not very much with libraries either, shame to admit it - places where I rather went to borrow than spend time studying.
Then I had a 10 year break in my professional life, unless being a housewife and mother can be considered as one of the steps in achieving a higher degree in life sciences.
After that, when the children were ready to let go of my skirt, I started thinking more of myself. The first step was to do some computer courses (done), then to find a job. I found one without much effort (those were the days!) however not in my previous subject but as an assistant in one of the Cambridge libraries. Being more precise - in seven of them at the same time (this is how many of the bigger and smaller libraries were then in the colleges within the Cambridge Theological Federation). I had become a library assistant working for just 12.5 hours a day, climbing up on the ladder on the route to librarianship slowly but steadily. During a little over 11 years of working in the same institution, the number of working hours grew to full time, I finished a 2 year course, completed with the certificate of the Level3 Progression Award in Library and Information Services. Then I became a senior library assistant, worked also part time in another library (in one of the University departments, not a theological one at all), participated in a number and variety of training courses, gained lots of new skills and experience under the very professional and friendly eye of my boss, grew to love cataloguing and really being very fond of everything I have been doing in this job.
A few years ago I had become an affiliated member of CILIP and started thinking about further progress. This thinking developed into contacting CILIP and being almost approved as a Chartership candidate. At that point all career progression stopped. My fault only.
Now that my full time post has been reduced I hope I will have more time for all sorts of activities and I really, really would like to do something more about it. Not long ago I participated in a couple of meetings organised by the Career Development Group of CILIP on career progression and building a portfolio. I think I know what to do now, the only hurdle is just to start. I hope that being a part of cpd23 is also a step in the right direction.